Q. What was your favorite part about being Chair of the AANS/CNS Joint Section of the Spine & Peripheral Nerves?

Dr. Wang: My favorite part about being Chair was working with the fantastic team that is the Executive Committee. The committee chairs and members have a vast reper- toire of skills and expertise that they generously share. They volunteer their time and skills because they believe in the difference we can make through the DSPN in influencing the direction of health care. I also had the opportunity to work with Juan Uribe and Dan Hoh, who created, organized, and delivered the amazing scien- tific program for the 2018 annual meeting.

Q. What was your biggest challenge this year?

Dr. Wang: There were four major challenges and areas of intense activity and accom- plishment this year. Many of these activities are continuing on into 2019 as well.

These were: public relations, rapid response, membership engage- ment, and strategic planning:

• Public Relations Task Force, led by Zo Ghogowala, was responsible for communicating with the public about neuro- surgical successes and positive patient impacts in the context of many negative press stories about spine surgery. This year’s annual meeting included the first ever Round Table discussion of Return to Productivity, including multiple stakeholders. DSPN social media presence also increased exponentially with the spine blog and Twitter. #Spine18 hashtag made 5,826,948 impressions during this year’s annual meeting!
• Rapid Response Committee: led by lou Tumialan and Charley Sansur, was charged to further develop into a proactive committee, rather than a “response” committee, and to inform research and guidelines efforts to target “high risk” areas where the DSPN anticipates challenges to surgical practice.
• Membership: led by Aruna Ganju, initiated programs to energize residents and fellows to join the DSPN and to continue active involvement and engagement with the DSPN after training.
• Strategic Planning: led by John Hurlbert, surveyed membership and designed short and long-term strategic goals and priorities for the DSPN to align with membership needs. Further surveys of residents, fellows, physician assis- tants and nurse practitioners are being analyzed to provide more insight into future DSPN meetings and activities.